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Tuesday, April 8, 2014

SPOTLIGHT: The Idea of Him by Holly Peterson

Have you ever wanted someone, something, so badly to be true that you’d overlook every shred of evidence to the contrary?

Enter Wade Crawford – the dazzling, urbane, hotshot magazine editor of Meter. With
gorgeous hazel eyes, strong shoulders, a chiseled face, and long
blondish hair, he was everything that Allie ever thought she wanted in a
man and a husband. Until she realized he was anything but.

In the fabulous and intrigue-packed new novel from Holly Peterson, the New York Times bestselling author of THE MANNY, THE IDEA OF HIM
(William Morrow | April 1, 2014 | Paperback Original | $14.99 | ISBN:
9780062283108) explores the dangers of falling for the idea of a person,
and why facing reality is more liberating than we ever dreamed it could
be. For anyone who’s let the fear of being alone keep them from seeing
who someone really is, THE IDEA OF HIM is an inspiring, action-packed story of what happens when we embrace our own power and allow the truth to finally set us free.

Allie Crawford is a
once-aspiring screenwriter turned successful public relations executive,
mother of two young children, with a marriage that feels more like a
hostessing gig than it does a relationship. At thirty
four, she is at a crossroads. Then she meets a head-turning,
traffic-stopping beauty at the bar of the famed New York City Tudor Room. When Allie finds her husband Wade locked in their laundry room with this same stunning blonde,
a scandal ensues that flips her life on its head. And when the woman
wants to befriend Allie, an old flame calls, and a new guy gets a little
too close for comfort, Allie starts to think her marriage is more of a
façade than something real. Maybe she’s fallen in love not with Wade—but
with the idea of him.

This intriguing blonde
is Jackie Malone, a business school student at Wharton who appears
unannounced in Allie Crawford’s world with an uncomfortable degree of
information about her personal and professional life. Showing up at all
the same parties, lunches, and with a seemingly quite intimate
relationship with Allie’s husband, Jackie is a feisty, gorgeous, leggy
fashionista that just might have the key to Allie’s future. If she can
only learn to trust her.

As Allie and Jackie
search for truth, they uncover scandals, betrayals, and financial crimes
worthy of front page headline news. Swiftly-paced and electrifying, THE IDEA OF HIM
follows their fast-growing friendship and the intimate, sexy
conversations they have as Allie takes command of her life and learns to
live on new terms that are alternately exciting and terrifying.

Set in present-day
Manhattan among the city’s established and up-and-coming power brokers,
many of them struggling to regain their equilibrium in a post 2008 crash
world, all working various angles—legal and not—in an effort to either
get ahead or simply keep up. Smack in the middle of New York’s upwardly
mobile meritocracy is the hard-working Allie, refusing to let her
working-class past cloud her fabulous present. Her story offers a
ringside seat at the lunch-time haunts featured in the pages of Vanity Fair, and is a ticket to the exclusive media cocktail parties posted on Guest of a Guest. But as Allie’s world starts closing in on her and she can no longer deny who her husband actually is, she must figure out how to do it all – without him.

THE IDEA OF HIM
shows a woman determined to pick herself back up and reclaim her life,
even as the fear of being alone threatens to lure her down the wrong
path. As Allie struggles to care for her children, tend to her demanding
boss, and navigate the high jinx in the psychological and financial
game-playing happening all around her, we fall in love with her
determination to root out the truth, and in doing so, finally put her
own interests and needs front and center. Most of all, we see the power
of female friendship as an unlikely ally – in the form of the
mysteriously seductive Jackie Malone – helps Allie to finally see the
truth about her husband. And it sets them both free.

about the author:

Holly Peterson is the author of the New York Times and international best seller, The Manny. She was a Contributing Editor for Newsweek and editor-at-large for Tina Brown’s Talk magazine.She
was also an Emmy Award–winning producer for ABC News for more than a
decade, where she cov­ered global politics. Her writing has been
published in the New York Times, Newsweek, Talk, the Daily Beast, Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, and other publications.

“THE IDEA
OF HIM is a coming-of-age book for grownups. It's fast-paced and
intriguing, glamorous and real -- not only a great, great read but a
tutorial in how to be your own best friend.”

—Elin Hilderbrand, author of BEAUTIFUL DAY

“Holly
Peterson has written a gripping, sophisticated story of high life
suspense that kept me riveted till I’d finished. THE IDEA OF HIM is
hugely enjoyable and vividly satisfying.” —Tina Brown of Tina Brown Live Media

“Holly
Peterson’s THE IDEA OF HIM is the perfect novel if you want to plunge
into great dialogue, a twisting and unexpected plot, shady Wall Street
schemes, betrayal, girlfriends… and sex. It is unputdownable.” —Lesley Stahl, CBS News 60 Minutes Anchor

“THE IDEA
OF HIM takes off like a rocket and doesn’t stop until the last page. In
this day and age where we are all so distracted, I relished a book that
held my attention with laser focus on sexy topics that we all relate
to: why we obsess over love, why we can’t leave when we should, and how
we find our strength through friendship and characters we can’t help but
adore.” —Katie Lee, TV Host, The Kitchen and Author of GROUNDSWELL

“THE IDEA
OF HIM is a deeply intriguing book filled with hilarious social satire
and sexy longing. This book explores falling in love with the idea of
someone rather than the person themselves…and how we cope with reality
once we wake up!” —Kelly Bensimon, Author and TV Personality